TotalEnergies, along with its partners, is commencing the construction of a major hybrid renewables project in South Africa.
The project includes a 216 MW solar plant and a 500 MWh battery storage system designed to address the intermittency of solar production.
The site will be located in the Northern Cape province, and will supply dispatchable renewable electricity to the South African national grid for twenty years.
This is equivalent to over 400 GWh per year.
In November, Eskom signed a Power Purchase Agreement for a project that supplies 75 MW of dispatchable power.
This continuous supply spans from 5 a.m. to 9:30 p.m., surpassing the available sunshine duration, thanks to the storage system.
The France-based energy company owns 35% of the consortium developing the project.
Its partners Hydra Storage Holding and Reatile Renewables controll 35% and 30%, respectively.
On December 14, the project achieved financial closure. It is expected to start operations in the year 2025.
It is a key component of the Risk Mitigation Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme.
TotalEnergies Elevating South Africa’s Energy Landscape
The Department of Mineral Resources and Energy launched the project.
The primary objective of this project is to improve electricity generation capacity in South Africa.
As a result, it will tackle the prevailing power supply challenges in the nation.
Vincent Stoquart, senior vice president for renewables at TotalEnergies stated,
“Together with our partners, we are pleased to launch this major solar power generation and storage project in South Africa.
“Thanks to its innovative hybrid design, it will enable us to supply continuous green electricity over a longer period and beyond the hours of sunshine.
“This project will not only contribute to the country’s energy transition, but also to strengthen the resilience of its power system.”
According to power utility Eskom, each megawatt can power 650 average homes.
Therefore, TotalEnergies’ planned plant could provide for about 140,000 households.